Exploring Gender Identity

Gender Transition

by Sequoia Elisabeth on January 20, 2011

What is the purpose of gender transition? A feeling of dysphoria is controlling your life, you feel uncomfortable in your body and out of place in your gender role. You feel compelled to live your life in the opposite gender and to do so fully, gender transition is necessary. There is a question of degree also. Do you feel like the other gender all the time or only occasionally? Will you be happy crossdressing and being in those gender roles part time? Not such an easy question to answer for many.

From my experience it is an evolution that begins early in your life when you first realize that you feel feminine more than masculine and have a male body, or vice versa. Like I said there are degrees and social constructs for you to step into. Will you be happy as a feminine man or masculine woman? What clothing are you most comfortable wearing, men’s or women’s or maybe both or even a mixture? Which gender role feels right?

Gender Identity is an internal function of your brain that is hardwired from birth and your journey here on earth is to discover who you are! Regardless of the physical body you were given at birth, this is about being harmonious in your body as the person you are naturally. Think about this for a minute, “Naturally“. What feels natural to you? What feels like second nature or instinctual for you? Forget that you have a body at all. Close your eyes and feel the Truth.

The gender transition journey involves living in harmony as who you are naturally. The mirror will often betray your self-image, so do not get distracted by what you see. The goal is to feel comfortable and happy with who you are being. If you can love the person in the mirror then you are doing great! As this is the ultimate goal. Transition is not about conforming to society’s expectations. Or what you perceive as society’s expectations. In fact this may be about your misconception of society’s expectations!

What are expectations and where do they come from? Expectations are behavior patterns that you accept as given per the circumstances. They come from your own mind and were passed on by those who raised you. You could say that they are learned, but I think it is more systemic than that. We are each like a cog in a clock, we fit in and do our part in the larger functioning of the clock. It could be argued that certain parts are not necessary, but that is a limited view. I prefer to say that each part is necessary or it would not be here, we just do not know the function or understand its purpose. Transgender often falls in this category.